John Foster
offers some practical suggestions on how a diverse constituency can maintain a
united front and face the future

We live in interesting times. For those of you
who have joined SSWSH we need to forge a future together. We must not forget
that our constituency is a large one and covers many different types and styles
of parish and organizations from the Prayer Book Catholics through to the Anglo
Papalists, from those who attend the Anglo-Catholic Charismatic Celebration and
the Walsingham Youth Pilgrimage to those more comfortable with the Extraordinary
Form of the Mass. All of these expressions of our Catholic faith in their
different ways seek to keep it alive, to express and spread the historic faith
of the Church to the modern world. This article seeks to suggest some ways
forward which might bring us all together.

Church planting

We need as a constituency to explore the
possibility of church planting, ensuring that in dioceses that do not have
resolution parishes there is at least one parish that could serve our
constituency. A mission church with a priest, perhaps paid for by the Catholic
Societies, who could act as a chaplain to those who have been un-churched by the
ordination of women. It would of course require people to travel, perhaps great
distances. It may mean sharing a car so an elderly neighbour can get to mass, or
organizing a minibus to pick people up. All of these things are possible and
must be done if we are serious about our future and about the conversion of
England. Such parishes could also be planted in parts of dioceses where there is
no Catholic presence.

New ideas

In some towns and diocese the reverse is true.
I can think of one northern town that currently has seven churches of our
constituency (and had at least three more that have either closed or rescinded
resolutions under pressure from the diocese).

These seven churches are currently served by
six clergy. This will not be sustainable in the future. As deaneries are
reorganized we too need to think about new ways of running these parishes. This
may mean some will need to close but where this is not possible clergy will have
to become better at sharing resources.

We may have to look to groups like the Company
of Mission Priests to found again clergy houses where three clergy live together
in order to serve six parishes in a town. The CMP model did work and may be the
way in the future that we can work parts of our constituency. It may be that
Catholic clergy on the ground will feel able to group together in their own
deaneries as a way of offering support and sharing resources between parishes.

Role of the laity

We need to consider the training not only of
our clergy but also of our laity. As Clare Rabjohns has pointed out in this
publication, not everyone is called to be ordained but that does not mean they
are not called to serve the Church, and that may mean receiving training and
guidance from the Church.

We need to be looking for young women and men
to be parish workers, youth workers, teachers and evangelists. We need to
provide them with solid Catholic teaching.

Young Catholics can often feel isolated (this
is why things like the Youth Pilgrimage are so wonderful as young people come
together and share their faith). Is it time perhaps FiF or indeed SSWSH brought
together a youth council to organize events to support young people in these
difficult times, to offer advice about courses to help them live out their
vocations? We do very well with those seeking ordination, but we need to expand
our horizons to equip all our young people (and the not so young) to preach the
good news.

Our constituency is wonderful when it is
together, when we go on pilgrimage with one another, when we share our faith. We
do perhaps need to find better ways for the Catholic Societies and parishes to
communicate with one another. In the 1930s there was a publication called the Anglo-Catholic
Annual which contained details about safe parishes, religious communities,
societiesí events and the like. Perhaps the time has come for a revival of
this just so we all know what is happening. I know from personal experience that
some Saturdays might have three different events in our constituency and I can
go to none of them! But just knowing is a good thing as it allows us to pray
about these events. Such an Annual might be a good way for societies to
share noteworthy sermons, homilies or lectures. So much goes on in our
constituency that we never hear about.

Serious about theology

Many of our critics accuse us of being
interested only in ritual, in not caring about theology or intellectual thought.
We know that this is rubbish. I hope as a constituency we might find a way of
supporting young catholic theologians lay and ordained, whether through an
academic conference, say, on the priesthood in this year of the priest, or
simply convening a day for catholic liturgists, theologians and biblical
scholars to come together. We have some great minds in our constituency who have
much to share with us and the Church, and who can further develop the work we
do. We need to show that we take these things seriously before it is too late
and we find ourselves relegated to history.
ND